Most high-level commands are accessed through the menu bar. This page offers a quick tour of the available menu items and their purpose. Note that plug-ins can add new items to these menus, so you may have items that are not listed here.
Tip: If you are looking for a particular menu item, use your browser’s find in page feature (usually Ctrl+F or ⌘+F) and type the name.
File commands apply to whole documents or projects.
Creates a new game component. The New Component Dialog is shown to let you pick the component type from searchable categories. An editor for the component will appear in the tab strip.
Creates a new project to manage groups of related components or create plug-ins.
Shows a file selection dialog that allows you to open an existing game component file. You can also open files by dragging and dropping the file icon onto Strange Eons.
Shows a project selection folder dialog that allows you to open an existing project. Only one project can be open at a time; it is displayed in a special pane on the left side of the application window.
Lists documents, and projects that you recently edited. Choose one to reopen it. Use the Clear Menu item to clear the list.
Closes the document that you are currently editing. You can also close a document by clicking the × on its tab.
Closes the currently open project and hides the project pane.
Saves the currently edited document. If you haven’t chosen a file name yet, this is the same as Save As.
Saves the currently edited document under a new file name; future Saves will also use the new file.
Saves all open files that have unsaved changes.
Creates a version of the current document by converting it to a different representation. Most commonly it is used to create image files for the game component you are editing.
Prints the current document. For more control over how game components are printed, or to print a group of components as a set, create a deck.
Exits the application. If you have files with unsaved changes you will be given a chance to save them first.
Editing commands that apply in most contexts, like copying the current selection to the clipboard.
Clears the contents of the current document, setting it to a “blank” state.
Creates a duplicate of the current game component or other document in a new tab. This is useful if you want to experiment with your design safely or create several components that will share common features.
Removes the selection from the document and places it on the clipboard. (The selection might be, for example, text in a text field, files in the project pane, or objects in a deck.)
Places a copy of the selection on the clipboard.
Pastes a compatible selection from the clipboard to the current control or editor. For example, you can paste text into a text field or an image into a portrait panel.
Selects all content in the current control, such all text in a text field or all objects on a deck page.
Searches for matching text (in editors that support this).
Searches for matching text in the files of the current project.
Opens the Preferences dialog to customize app settings.
Options that affect how content is displayed, especially how game component previews are drawn.
Allows you to adjust the quality of game components previews to balance legibility and speed. The default is Adjust Automatically which will continually adjust the quality based on how long drawing takes. Reasonably powerful systems can probably lock this on High or Ultrahigh. On less powerful systems, you may also want to adjust the preview update rate preference.
Allows you to choose the background you prefer for game component previews, from dark, light, or checked. Checked can be useful for components with complex outlines.
Toggles whether the context bar is visible. This is a small floating tool bar that pops up next to whatever text field or deck page you are editing. It adjusts the options it shows depending to what you are editing.
Toggles whether object handles are shown in the deck editor. These are used to resize or rotate objects in a deck. It is sometimes useful to temporarily hide them to get a clearer view of what you are working on.
Toggles whether grid lines are shown in the deck editor.
Toggles whether the page margin is shown in the deck editor.
Toggles whether the source navigator panel is shown in the source code editor (when the file type supports navigation).
Commands that let you change the expansion symbol displayed on supported game components. An expansion is a collection of related content that builds on a base game but is released together as a separate product. Manufacturers often mark the expansion content with a small graphical symbol so it can be easily separated out from the base game again. This menu lets you mark your own components with one or more expansion symbols, when supported by the game’s plug-in.
Create a new expansion symbol for an existing game.
Copy the expansion symbol(s) from the currently edited game component. This does not affect the system clipboard, which is controlled from the Edit menu.
Pastes the last-copied expansion symbol(s) onto the current component, replacing any existing symbols.
Allows you to choose from different variants of the symbols; the meaning of this depends on the game.
Quickly pick an expansion for the current game component.
Opens a dialog that allows you to choose one or more expansions for the component.
Commands that alter how text is formatted on game components by inserting markup tags.
Modifies the horizontal alignment and justification of the selected paragraphs, and the vertical alignment of the entire text box.
Modifies the colour of the selected text.
Modifies the font family, size, width, style, and letter spacing of the selected text.
Inserts an image from an image file, Web URL, or special URL.
Insert hard-to-type characters.
Changes the current selection into a heading (H1).
Changes the current selection into a subheading (H2).
Applies bold/italic/underline/strikethrough style to the selected text.
Applies superscript/subscript style to the selected text.
Opens the abbreviation editor to define game-specific abbreviations that reduce typing.
Commands specific to laying out objects in the deck editor.
These commands move the selected objects in front of, or behind, other objects on the same page. You can think of the objects in the deck as paper cutouts that you can arrange in layers, one atop the other. These commands move objects towards the top or bottom layer.
Turn the selected objects in 90° increments, or mirror them horizontally or vertically.
Aligns or spreads out the selected objects in various ways against the last object that was added to the selection.
Changes the classes of objects that the selected objects will snap to. See the deck editor page for details.
Combine the selected objects into a group, or break the group back into individual objects. Group objects are treated as a single entity.
Opens the style dialog, which lets you edit the style attributes (colour, line width, and so on) of the selected objects.
Copies the style attributes of the selected object.
Applies the last copied style attributes onto the selected objects.
Locks or unlocks the selected objects. (Unlock All unlocks everything, selected or not.) Locked objects cannot be selected by left clicking them as usual; this prevents you from moving them by accident. Locked objects can still be selected by right clicking on them and using the Select menu.
Centres the objects on the page, both horizontally and vertically. Useful for neat freaks and after changing paper sizes.
Commands specific to the source code editor, which is usually used to develop new plug-ins. Refer to the developer manual for further information.
Save and run the edited script.
Save and run the edited script in debug mode: a breakpoint is set at the top of the script. The script debugger must be enable for this to work properly.
If you are editing a file that belongs to a plug-in task folder in a project, this will build a plug-in bundle. Equivalent to the using the same command in the project pane.
If you are editing a file that belongs to a plug-in task folder in a project, this will open the Test Plug-in dialog.
Tidy up the file by remove extraneous whitespace from the ends of lines.
Move the selected lines up or down in the source file.
Comments out the selected block of text so it will be ignored, or removes those comment markers.
Sort the selected lines of text. Allows the use of complex sorting rules.
Plays back the most recently recorded macro, a sequence of keystrokes that you record and then play back to repeat them.
Starts or stops recording a new macro. The caret turns red when macro recording is active. You can play back the current macro while recording a new macro.
Offer suggestions to complete a fragment of script code. You can choose a suggestion using the ↑, ↓, and Enter keys. Only applies to scripts and currently only partially implemented.
Opens the abbreviation editor to define type-specific abbreviations that reduce typing.
Commands for installing and activating plug-ins. Plug-ins that add user-activated “tools” will be listed here; selecting their respective menu item activates the tool in question. There are also commands here for managing plug-ins:
Opens the Updates dialog to change the automatic update settings.
Opens the Plug-in Catalogue to install or update plug-ins.
Opens the Plug-in Manager to browse installed plug-ins, uninstall them, or assign keyboard shortcuts to tool plug-ins.
Commands that let you switch between open documents and show or hide floating tool windows such as the script output window.
Commands that provide access to information about the app and developer documentation.
Displays help information for your current activity, if available, or else the user manual.
Displays the contents page of the named manual.
Opens the document browser, which lets you explore document collections installed by plug-ins, such as API documentation.
Opens a bug reporting dialog.
Opens the About dialog, which displays credits, version, and license information.